I recently attended a seminar by Lukas Visagie of the
Operational Research
Society of South Africa, which addressed some of the difficulties
facing the OR
profession in South Africa. Part of the thesis espoused by Lukas was
that OR in
South Africa had lost direction, through an inability to establish its
position
in a market which accommodates all of the possible manifestations which
business
and management service industries can take. In essence, OR in South
Africa had
a brand-awareness problem, brought about by an inability for its
Society to
define the discipline clearly and market it effectively. The realm of
the
discipline was being invaded by consultants of every shade and hue,
with no
allegiance to, or even awareness of, Operational Research. These
concerns are
not peculiar to South Africa; the May 1996 issue of the JORS Newsletter
outlines
preliminary proposals by the UK Society to establish a professional
membership
status for Operational Research practitioners, so as to serve as a
means of
guaranteeing good workmanship for clients, as well as sharpening the
image of
OR.

So should we also be raising concerns like these in ORSNZ? I
seem to
remember some comments at the 1995 Conference about the threat to OR
from fields
such as computer science, but these did not seem to be taken very
seriously by
most members. Are we being short-sighted here?

First of all, it is interesting to speculate on why New
Zealand
practitioners on the whole do not feel threatened by other disciplines.
My
hypothesis is that most OR/MS activity in New Zealand has traditionally
been
concerned with situations which have been treated with mathematical
models
requiring some level of technical competence, either in statistics,
stochastic
processes, or optimization. In my view, this is partly because, in its
early
days, OR/MS in New Zealand developed in universities and the AMD group
of DSIR,
and so has developed a culture based on the development of new
mathematical techniques and their application. More recently the
technical side of the
subject has been rejuvenated by advances in computer technology, which
mean
that the implementation of previously intractable models is now
possible. My
point is that in New Zealand, OR/MS has been defined by its successes
using
technical expertise. So we should not (and in fact do not) feel
particularly
threatened by, say, a competitor properly applying a linear programming
model,
since they are doing what we recognize as OR, albeit under a different
name.

The perceived threat, I conjecture, comes at the so-called
"soft"
end of the discipline. Here it is more difficult to identify if an
individual
has the right stuff to be called an OR practitioner. It is not clear
whether
having some tertiary qualification is an adequate signal in this
context. The
education required to address poorly structured problems can be gained
to some
extent in a formal setting — how to impart this education is a big
challenge for OR/MS academics — but, in my view, most of it is acquired
in
the University of Life. ( I must confess to being unable to make a
well-informed judgement of management education in this context, but it
often
appears to me that management theories are, perhaps necessarily, based
on
observations of what seems to be current practice, rather than on
analysis.) Consequently, it is difficult for companies to assess
whether they should hire
the consultant calling herself a Business Consultant, or her competitor
who
claims expertise in OR/MS. In summary, the technical tools of the OR/MS
trade
acquired (in most cases) through some form of tertiary qualification,
can serve
to identify members of the OR/MS profession; on the other hand, the
soft side of
OR/MS has less recognizable calling cards.

On a philosophical level, I think that all of us involved in
OR/MS would be
unwilling to define the discipline simply in terms of its techniques.
So I hope
to be forgiven for appearing to advocate this. However definitions are
sometimes unhelpful when trying to make a sale. My definition of OR/MS
is "quantitative
problem solving", but using this definition does not help market the
discipline to its potential clients, or identify the great
contributions that
OR/MS can make. The reputation of OR/MS I believe comes from its track
record.
This ultimately rests not in some of its simple manifestations, such
as, say, trivial spreadsheet calculations, but in its contribution
towards solving or
understanding situations of considerable complexity. In most cases
these
situations require sophisticated techniques, and it is in the ability
to develop
and apply these techniques that OR/MS can expect to preserve its
comparative
advantage over other competing disciplines. Indeed as the so-called
"information"
revolution continues to deluge us with data, we will all come to rely
on the
tools of OR/MS to filter the information from the flood.

The prescription for OR/MS is clear. On the academic side we
need to
provide our graduating students with state-of-the-art OR/MS techniques.
My
view, which I am sure is not shared by all readers, is that these
techniques
should form the core of an OR/MS curriculum, and be supported by
example
applications, contrived if they need to be, which give tangible results
(like an
optimal solution) to reinforce the student's confidence and enjoyment.
The
learning experience gained by a first-year student applying a
nontrivial
technique to a relatively complicated example is in my view more
valuable than
his endeavours applying common sense to try and model a poorly
structured
problem. Of course providing people with the ability and confidence to
attack
such problems is important, and we would be short-changing our students
if we
let them graduate thinking that OR/MS is just the simplex algorithm. On
the
other hand, successful OR/MS modelling requires experience of the
world, as well
as some intellectual framework with which to structure this experience,
so,
until some measure of both of these have been acquired, OR/MS case
studies and
open-ended OR/MS projects should not be a major part of our academic
programmes.

Is there a presciption for practitioners of OR/MS? If they
want to
establish or preserve an advantage over other competing disciplines,
then they
must in my view be one step ahead of the competition. This means
tackling the
complex problems for which common sense and logic are not enough to
yield a good
answer. It also means staying in touch with advances in modelling
methodology
and algorithms. Of course, there will always be a delay in the adoption
of
new methods in practice — it is not usually cost effective for
practitioners to develop and implement a complicated algorithm from
scratch. For example, before the development of modelling languages
like GAMS and AMPL,
few companies would consider the considerable expense of commissioning
a
purpose-built branch-and-bound code. But the accessibility of these
methods
has improved, along with theoretical understanding, to the point where
they can
be implemented relatively routinely by practitioners. An important
observation to make in this case is that the efficacy of the algorithm
can rely
critically on the formulation, a fact that should be taught in any
OR/MS course
on mathematical programming. It is from knowledge of this type that the
practitioner of OR/MS derives a competitive advantage.

In conclusion, let us concur that we should all be
"quantitative
solvers" addressing the broad range of problems which arise in OR/MS.
We
should also make use of common sense as a modelling tool when
appropriate. However, let me advocate that we should resist promoting
applied common sense as
our main modus operandi. Instead we should promote OR/MS by our
successful
endeavours to tackle challenging problems, which are too complicated to
model
using a simplistic approach, and promulgate the idea that OR/MS is a
discipline
that can make significant contributions to decision making in complex
circumstances.

Earlier this year, The Ministry of Research, Science &
Technology
launched a project to describe and analyse New Zealand's knowledge base
in order
to bring a ?fresh science-based perspective' to the management of
public
investment in science. The first step was to build a concise and
comprehensive
profile of NZ science, to inform the general public
and those directly
concerned with making decisions on public science funding of where NZ
science is
at. Professor David Ryan from the Department of Engineering Science at
the
University of Auckland was asked to serve as profile author for
Operations
Research. I consider that it is of sufficient general
interest, both in
terms of the current state of OR in NZ, but also on its historical
development,
to be reprinted in full below.

AREA PROFILE: OPERATIONS RESEARCH

David Ryan, Department of Engineering Science,
University of Auckland,
Auckland

1. Introduction

Operations Research is a relatively young subject which
involves the
application of scientific methods to solve a wide variety of decision
problems
occurring mainly in business and industry. The problems often involve
decisions
about the optimal or efficient use of scarce or valuable resources.
Many of the
methods of Operations Research are based on the development of
mathematical
models and the associated solution algorithms for these models. In this
sense,
Operations Research can be considered as a branch of the mathematical
sciences,
but since the applications occur in business and industry, the ultimate
impact
of the subject should be assessed in the context of these problems and
applications. In fact Operations Research should be considered as an
interdisciplinary subject with important links and connections to the
mathematical areas of optimization, probability and statistics, and
discrete
mathematics, as well as the other subject areas of economics, finance,
engineering, management, and computer science. The importance of the
practical
application is a distinguishing feature of the subject of Operations
Research,
and research usually involves the modification, extension and adaption
of both
models and solution methods to solve specific problems. Besides its
links to
areas of mathematics, the subject also includes methods of a more
subjective
nature; in this profile we focus on the more quantitative or
mathematical
aspects of Operations Research.

Mathematical Programming is one of the most important areas of
mathematics
associated with Operations Research. Fundamental research in
mathematical
programming is often undertaken without the motivation of applications,
and the
importance of such work is often recognised by its subsequent use in
the context
of Operations Research.

Computers play an essential role in research activities since
most important
practical applications give rise to models which can only be solved
with
significant computer power. Major advances have resulted from the rapid
increase in computational power.

The omission of Operations Research in the proposed subject
classification
is perhaps not surprising if the classification originated in
Australia. Research activity in Operations Research has for many years
been much more
prominent and successful in New Zealand than in Australia. It is
interesting to
note that the recent review of Mathematical Sciences in Australia
(Mathematical
Sciences: Adding to Australia, Australian Government Publishing
Service, 1996)
identified "a significant weakness in the research framework
underpinning
Operations Research" and recommended as its second specific
recommendation
that "The Australian Research Council be encouraged to designate the
field
of Operations Research as a priority area for ARC grants, particularly
as a Key
Centre of Teaching and Research".

2. New Zealand's Knowledge Base

2.1 Historical Overview

The development of Operations Research in New Zealand was
pioneered during
the mid 1960s by an active OR group within the old Applied Mathematics
Division
of DSIR and by a small number of individuals at Auckland, Victoria and
Canterbury Universities. (In acknowledging the important pioneering
role of the
OR Group in the DSIR, it is very sad to record that the activities of
this group
have recently been terminated in IRL). The interdisciplinary nature of
the
subject is reflected in more recent developments with active
researchers now
working in the application areas of management, statistics and
engineering and
forestry with relatively few persons working directly in mathematics. A
special
feature of the subject development and the underlying research in New
Zealand
can be identified in the focus on, and successful solution of,
important
practical problems involving applications of both national and
international
importance. For example, the work in Energy Modelling and Air-Crew
Scheduling,
discussed in more detail in Section 2.2, has attracted international
attention
and has had a significant impact in those application areas in New
Zealand. Research has been and continues to be motivated by the need to
solve these
difficult practical problems. This can be contrasted with the emphasis
on more
theoretical research amongst most of the international OR community,
particularly in the US. Amongst the current researchers in the subject,
there
are a number who have international reputations in their own areas of
expertise,
and their contributions have received international recognition.

For many years the Operational Research Society of New Zealand
has provided
a focus for activities in the subject by holding an annual conference
which has
attracted participation from both researchers and representatives of
business
and industry. The papers presented at these meetings reflect the
success of OR
activities in New Zealand.

2.2 Strengths

In assessing the strengths of Operations Research in New
Zealand, one can
identify a number of application areas in which important research
contributions
have been made. In some cases the research has had a significant impact
in New
Zealand. Contributions can be classified by application area or by
methodology. We have chosen to present the following classification of
research
contributions by application with reference where appropriate to
innovation in
areas of methodology.

Economic systems modelling: Significant research work
associated with
the development of economic equilibrium models has been carried out at
Victoria
University of Wellington. The underlying modelling work has obvious
connections
to areas of operations research, such as optimization and simulation.
Much of
this work is of distinct New Zealand character since it is based on the
special
features of the New Zealand economy.

Energy modelling: There have been significant advances in
research on
models and techniques in the energy sector, in particular for optimal
electricity generation and dispatch. This research has been carried out
in the
Energy Modelling Research Group at the University of Canterbury and in
more
recent times also at the University of Auckland. The uniqueness of New
Zealand's hydro-thermal system has required the development of
innovative
optimization methods for scheduling power generation. These include
discrete
optimization techniques for the short-term unit commitment problems and
stochastic dual dynamic programming for long-term reservoir planning.
Recent
research has focussed on the development of models for designing a
deregulated
electricity market and investigating its implications.

Forestry: The Forest Research Institute and more recently
Auckland and
Canterbury Universities have been involved in the development of
Operations
Research models covering most areas of forestry from harvest planning
to logging
operations to timber milling. Much of the research has been based on
the
innovative use of optimization models and methods, but heuristics have
also
played an important part in the work. This work has distinct New
Zealand
character and has attracted international attention.

Production Scheduling: Research at the Universities of
Auckland,
Canterbury and Waikato has focussed on issues of inventory and
production
scheduling. This work has led to new heuristic methods for problems,
including
stochastic parallel machine scheduling, scheduling with controllable
processing
times and costs, early-tardy scheduling models, and project scheduling
with a
stochastic evolution structure.

Personnel Scheduling: Significant research in the
application areas of
crew and staff scheduling and rostering has been carried out during the
past
decade mainly at the University of Auckland. New Zealand contributions
to the
solution methods for set partitioning optimization have made it
possible to
solve massive set partitioning models which arise in staff scheduling
and
rostering applications, and these advances have had an important impact
in the
development of planning and rostering methods at Air New Zealand and in
a number
of other New Zealand organisations.

Telecommunications: Research into telecommunications
models has
proceeded on two fronts. There have been significant methodological
contributions made in the area of stochastic queueing networks and
their
behaviour. The study of these is important for developing and testing
routing
strategies for voice and data communications networks. Significant
advances
have also been made in the development of optimization techniques for
designing
local access networks for voice, data and video transmission.

Transportation: Research into vehicle scheduling and fleet
deployment,
using both heuristic methods and methods based on generalised
assignment models,
have enabled the development of decision support systems for the
routing of
large vehicle fleets.

2.3 Distinctive New Zealand Character

Five areas of research activity during the past ten years have
had a
distinct New Zealand character.

Economic systems modelling: The economic systems modelling
work has been
of particular relevance to New Zealand because of the open nature of
the economy
and its dependence on overseas trade.

Energy modelling: The New Zealand electricity generation
system is
significantly different from overseas systems because of its high
reliance on
hydro generation, the Cook Strait DC cable and the inability to import
power
from abroad in the case of shortfall. Because of these features,
considerable
research has been devoted to the development of models and solution
techniques
to schedule power generation from stations on a river chain as well as
models
for ensuring security and efficiency of electricity supply in the long
term.

Forestry : Since forestry is an important component of the
New Zealand
economy, it offers important opportunities for the application of
Operations
Research methods. The Forest Research Institute in Rotorua has made a
major
contribution for more than ten years in many areas and their work is
recognised
internationally. More recently, research at the Universities of
Auckland and
Canterbury has focussed on more detailed modelling involving short and
medium
term harvest scheduling, log bucking, truck dispatch for logging
operations, and
log-breakdown models for optimal timber production.

Personnel Scheduling: Research in the area of personnel
scheduling and
rostering has been carried out in collaboration with Air New Zealand
and has
resulted in the airline being amongst the first airlines worldwide to
successfully implement optimization based methods for both planning and
rostering.

Transportation: Vehicle scheduling research has been
motivated by
practical problems arising in the New Zealand dairy and petroleum
industries. The methods developed in this research are being used by a
number of
organisations in New Zealand.

2.4 Gaps in the Knowledge Base

Areas in which there is a recognised gap in technical
expertise include
simulation, control processes, maintenance and reliability and
polyhedral
combinatorics. While each of these areas could be considered important,
such
judgements should be made in the context of potential applications in
New
Zealand.

3. New Zealand's Capability

In the field of Operations Research there are two main groups
at the
Universities of Auckland and Canterbury. Smaller groups exist at
Waikato,
Massey and Victoria Universities and also at the Forest Research
Institute. Isolated individuals with research interests in Operations
Research also exist
at other universities. Although little research is undertaken outside
the
Universities and FRI, strong collaboration with companies and
industries has
provided important motivation for research and has resulted in many
successful
applications of the subject in New Zealand. Collaboration with outside
organisations (such as Air New Zealand, ECNZ and Telecom) has also
provided many
opportunities for postgraduate research at both Masters and PhD level,
and this
has resulted in strong graduate programmes at both Auckland and
Canterbury.

In contrast to many other countries, there has been an obvious
commitment in
New Zealand to undertake research motivated by real practical
applications. Despite its past success in this area, the termination of
the activities of the
Operations Research Group at Industrial Research Ltd has resulted in a
serious
decrease in the opportunities to make contact with New Zealand business
and
industry. This is to be regretted. The termination of the activities of
the IRL
Group may be related to issues of research funding.

Because of the interdisciplinary and practical nature of the
subject there
is serious concern that public funding of research activities in
Operations
Research is not well supported. Classifications of research areas
seldom
include Operations Research and applicants for research funding have
been
advised that because of the practical or commercial implications of
research
proposals, they should instead seek funding from private business or
industry. While in some circumstances such funding may be available, it
is unfortunately
true that private enterprise is seldom inclined to fund research which
is not of
immediate commercial value. This is especially true if the proposal
involves
significant underlying research and development. A similar situation
has
existed in Australia and this has been highlighted in the recent review
of
Mathematical Sciences in Australia.

4. Opportunities

Areas in which there is further opportunity for the
development and
application of Operations Research methods include transportation,
health,
agriculture/horticulture, finance and risk management, engineering
design,
public policy OR, and the environment. Some contributions have been
made in
each of these areas, but success has been limited. Often the
limitations are
due to the lack of communication between researchers and key personnel
in the
application areas. Such links with business and industry are vital for
successful research activity. The establishment of these links has
relied on
the commitment of a small number of researchers and the willingness of
business
and industry leaders to participate in such research and development
projects.

5. Conclusion

For a country of New Zealand's size, the research output of
our small
Operations Research activity has had significant impact. In a number of
application areas highlighted above, the subject has made significant
contributions to New Zealand business and industry, and the underlying
models
and methodology developments have attracted international recognition
in a
number of areas.

The most important needs in the area of Operations Research
are to further
develop links with businesses and industries to provide practical
motivation for
research and to establish proper avenues for the funding of underlying
research
through public funding agencies.

Golbon Zakeri, Department of Engineering Systems,
University of
Auckland, Auckland

Professor John R. Birge of the University of Michigan visited
the University
of Auckland from August 15th to August 22nd, as a guest of the
University of
Auckland Foundation. Professor Birge is Chair of the Department of
Industrial
and Operations Engineering at the University of Michigan, and is a
world-renowned expert on models and methods for decision making under
uncertainty. Professor Birge has applied such models to problems
arising in
electric power systems, finance, transportation, and manufacturing, and
made
major theoretical contributions to the field of stochastic programming.
Professor Birge is Editor-in-Chief of the international journal Mathematical
Programming, Series B, and Associate Editor of a large number
of
prestigious international journals. He gave three seminars while in
Auckland,
and I interviewed him for the ORSNZ Newsletter. The transcript of this
interview follows.

GZ: How did you start your work in Stochastic Programming (SP)?

JRB:I was working at Stanford with George Dantzig and he had a
model called
PILOT; it was an energy model and he wanted to include into it
probabilities of
disruptions, like the oil embargo, and that's how I got interested.
Actually the
other thing was that Dantzig gave a talk when I first got there. He
drew a
diagram showing Stochastic and Deterministic and Static and Dynamic
where he
wrote the names of the people who had worked in each area, and he said
that the
Stochastic Dynamic area hardly anyone has worked in, so I thought maybe
that is
an area I ought to work in. So it was these two things. The problem we
had and
the open area.

GZ: What was it like being supervised by George Dantzig?

JRB:I enjoyed working with Dantzig. He is a good advisor if
you really know
what you want to do. He has tremendous insight, so when he would tell
me "I'm
not sure if that works" I knew I had to go back and check it, or if
said "yeah,
this looks like a good approach" then that meant OK, that is what I
should
try. I enjoyed it a lot, to me he was ideal.

GZ: Could you mention and explain some of your results that
had a big impact
on the field?

JRB:The one thing that I did for my thesis was to create the
concept of
?Value of Stochastic Solution'. It showed how just having a stochastic
model can
make a difference. It is not the same thing as the expected value of
perfect
information and may be more relevant than the the expected value of
perfect
information which you might not be able to collect as data. So it's a
good
measure for certain modeling capabilities. I have also done work in
decomposition, computation and bounds for a Stochastic Programming, and
interior point methods, and other types of models.

GZ: What is the current status of stochastic programming
vis-à-vis US
industries? Is it used as a standard tool?

JRB:I don't think it's a standard tool. I think it's being
used more than in
the past. A lot more people are interested in it and aware of it.
Before people
thought it couldn't be used because the models were too complex, but as
we're
able to solve bigger models, then it comes into practice.

GZ: So is the ability to solve more complex models a result of
new
techniques or technology, or both?

JRB:Both of them.

GZ: Do you perceive SP as an appropriate technique for the
finance industry
and has there been any quantitative advances based on SP in that
industry (e.g.,
Wall Street)?

JRB:There are a number of people using SPs in Wall Street in
Asset Liability
Management and also in Fund Management. I think it's become popular.
Some
people, like Ron Dembo's company, sell software in Wall Street, they
solve SPs
mainly dealing with Fund Management. There are some other people who do
Asset
Liability Management. These are problems where in the past people used
heuristics or very gross approximations, and they were missing things,
such as
not matching an asset or not matching their liabilities exactly. So
Stochastic
Programs actually help do that better.

GZ: What are the main unsolved problems in Stochastic
Programming?

JRB:Well, I think in general just finding the expectation of a
multi-dimensional integral that involves another optimization problem.
There are
no techniques that work in all circumstances, so that's a general
problem. Now
there are some results, Quasi Monte Carlo results, that say there are
good
asymptotic bounds, but I think there needs to be a lot more work to get
more
information on when those bounds actually apply. I think other things
involve
Stochastic Integer Programs. There is a limited set of SIPs that have
been
solved, and there is a lot of work there that could be done on how to
solve
those problems. I think of the area of continuous time problems: how to
merge SP
with ideas from, say, Stochastic Control, is an area where a lot more
work could
be done. And I guess nonlinear problems. There hasn't been that much
work, so
there is probably room for taking advantage of Stochastic Programming
structures
in nonlinear problems. The way most people do them now is they just
solve the
deterministic equivalent. Theoretically there are also questions about
what
happens asymptotically in SPs solution with sampling; for example,
there aren't
really any results, like if you sample a problem and the optimum is not
unique,
then what is the asymtotic distribution of the sampled optima? There's
no theory
there, so that's an open question, and even when it's known, it's not
clear how
you can compute that distribution,or how you can use confidence
intervals.

GZ: What is your feeling about the future direction of
Stochastic
Programming?

JRB:Well, I think a lot of it is going to be oriented towards
applications.
So I would say a broader range of applications. Then the other thing
would be,
say, modeling interfaces that make it easy to create models. As it is
now, it
requires a high degree of expertise to create a Stochastic Programming
model. So
I think there will probably be a lot of work in terms of automating
that process
to make it easier to actually create a Stochastic Program.

GZ: There is a school of thought that believes Operations
Research is too
theoretical in America. What is your view?

JRB:Well, there is some work in OR which is quite theoretical.
I think there
has been a trend away from that recently. I don't think the biggest
problem is
whether there is too much theory. I think a bigger problem is when
people are
working on problems that aren't really proper applications. They may
seem
practical, but they're not; they don't really exist. To me, people are
doing too
much of making up a problem that doesn't really exist and trying to
solve it.
That's not really theory, it's supposed to be applied work, but it's
not an true
application. I think the other problem is just that there is a lot of
marginal
improvements and not really bold, new stuff. Sort of a security of the
past
which is easy to get trapped into.

GZ: In your opinion, what are the key ingredients in an OR
curriculum and
what should be the proportions?

JRB:I think it's important for an OR curriculum to have
certain amount of
the foundations which are optimization, stochastic modeling, and I
think every
OR student should have a basic background in these primaries. I think
every
student should have some application that they are familiar with in
context of
the models that they work on, and beyond that I think it's mainly up to
the
individual. One other area that I think a lot of OR practitioners need
more of
is statistics. They need an understanding of statistics to create
models. That's
the basis for the parameters they use in the models. Otherwise I think
that the
program should be fairly flexible in letting the students to choose
their own
areas of specialization.

GZ: What do you believe are the advantages and disadvantages
of having a
department of Operations Research in a school of Engineering?

JRB:The advantage in the school of Engineering is that you're
immersed in
applications, and there is at least the potential for interaction with
other
engineers. A disadvantage is that in the US we are not perceived as
being
engineers, and we don't have the ability or need for grant funding, and
there is
perhaps a lack of appreciation of theory. There are very few OR
departments that
can exist within a business school [in the US] since it's perhaps not
of
immediate relevance to MBAs. I think in math departments it can do well
if the
math department recognizes the value of application,s and there may not
be that
many of them. Our department has done well because we try to work with
people in
Engineering and maintain ties with math and business school.

Quite by chance in the last few weeks I have come across two
applications of
OR/Statistics in an area that I would not have thought of — litigation.
In
both cases modelling was being used to back up one side in a court case.

In one instance (related to me by an MBA) , a company was
trying to prove
fraud by an employee and part of the evidence was a statistical
analysis to show
that the employee's actions were significantly different from what
would be
expected. In the other example, now being published, a contractor who
was
working on the Channel Tunnel was sued for contract overruns in both
time and
cost. The contractor claimed that this was mainly because of many last
minute
changes to the specifications and was, therefore, not the contractor's
fault. A
model was built to map the history of the project, firstly using
cognitive
mapping and then transferring into systems dynamics. This latter model
was
supposed to represent accurately what actually happened. In this
example, the
case was settled satisfactorily out of court partly, it is believed,
because of
the modelling evidence.

This particular application of modelling seems very
interesting to me —
especially if the cases get to court. Can you imagine having to stand
up and
defend one of your models, and all its possibly questionable
assumptions,
against a smart lawyer trying to discredit it? I, for one, would be
quite
nervous of doing this, but one could argue that OR models that have
significant
implications and consequences should be put through just such a process
of
critique.

Anyway, my interest has now been aroused and I would like to
conduct a
survey of the general use of modelling in litigation. Is it very common
or quite
rare? Is it becoming more common in this increasingly litigious world?
Can we
develop guidelines for good practice to help people who find themselves
and
their models on trial? If you are aware of any examples of modelling
being used
in litigation, or any studies or surveys, please let me know at the
above e-mail
or postal address.

John Buchanan, Department of Management Systems,
University of Waikato,
Hamilton

In the last twenty years the world has seen a change in the
way technology
has impacted society. Before this modern epoch of an "Information
Society",
technology was utilized for a specific purpose. The simplicity of the
technological applications allowed for a complete understanding of the
ramifications. Even a relatively complex technology, such as a
precision
timepiece, was understandable in its general effect. However, some
technologies, it can be argued, are responsible for greater effects
than
intended. In America, the advent of a mass produced and affordable
automobile
was thought, by some, to be the major cause in the rise of the
birthrate.

We are observing, in our present decade an important
technological
convergence; that is, the coming together of computing and
communication
technologies. The potential impact of this technological convergence is
significant and likely to exceed our often modest expectations.

How does this concern management education? The technological
convergence
of computing and communication technologies — its most notable and
publicly visible offspring to date being the Internet — makes
information
very accessible. Perhaps it is like automatic teller machines; it is
now very
easy to get your money out when you want to. At least two New Zealand
universities, that I am aware of, are teaching courses completely over
the
Internet. There is pressure to technologize management (read OR, given
the
flavour of this newsletter) education.

But what does this mean? What are the impacts of such
technologizing? Can
it stimulate deeper, as opposed to surface, learning? As a university
teacher I
see the necessity of using technology to support my teaching (if for no
other
reason than that students will be using such technology in the
workplace), but
that use of technology is mixed with a large measure of caution. My
anecdotal
evidence suggests that the multimedia approach of turning a course, or
part of
one, into an interactive experience can be a lot of work with
relatively small
marginal benefits. Much greater benefit can be gained, in my view, by
exploiting the asynchronous communication opportunities afforded by the
Internet; what we usually refer to as email. Last year I was a silent
(but
invited) observer of a group of five working men, who were studying for
a
distance MBA qualification. They were located in both New Zealand and
Australia,
and their not inconsiderable interaction and willing contribution of
their own
material greatly enhanced their collective learning — they all passed!
In
our large, first year Management Systems course at the University of
Waikato,
students are required to work in small "buzz" groups. One of their
greatest challenges (aside from motivation) is to find a time to meet
together. Synchronous communication is difficult and writing letters is
too slow. E-mail
is a viable alternative.

I resist the demand from students for stimulation, wherein
"bright and
loud is better". Teachers will increasingly make use of technology in
education, with some real benefits. But the effects are less well
known, and a
good many of the costs of so doing are hidden. And what of managers and
practitioners? A recurring phrase is that of "perpetual learning" —
of people who keep on actively learning. How can information technology
support
this? It certainly provides the means to disseminate and communicate
information. Perhaps the role of the educator will, as Don Norris from
George
Mason University said to me the other day, become more of synthesis; of
pulling
together the vast amount of information available and providing useable
chunks
or snippets for the perpetual learner.

Hi, I am just reaching the end of a very enjoyable stay in New
Zealand. I
have been on six months study leave from Warwick University, UK, where
I lecture
in OR and Systems. I have been hosted by Hans Daellenbach at the
University of
Canterbury. I, and my family, have found NZ to be a really beautiful
and
interesting place and have found people very welcoming. We got round
many, but
not all, of the sights, and I managed to visit most of the universities.

I am actually writing this note about a society of which I am
currently the
Chair — the UK Systems Society. The UKSS is fairly small, about 300
members, and aims to promote the development of systems ideas in theory
and in
practical decision making. Although it is called the UK society, it is
actually
international in character with about 40% of its membership from
outside the UK.
Its main activities at the moment are a quarterly journal - The
Systemist
- that is free to members, and a biennial international conference. The
next
conference will be held in Milton Keynes in July 1997 and the theme is
"Systems
for Sustainability: People, Organizations and Environments". For
details
contact Prof. Ray Ison, Systems Department, Open University, Milton
Keynes MK7
6AA, e-mail: [email protected].

In my time as Chair I hope to expand the activities and
membership of the
Society, and to this end we are inviting feedback as to what would make
the
Society more effective and attractive for members and potential
members. Below
is the text of my first Chair's Report published in Systemist in March:

Chairperson's Report: March 1996

Kia Ora, as they say over here in New Zealand, from where I am
writing my
first report as Chair of the UK Systems Society. I am lucky enough to
be
enjoying six months study (January to June) leave at the University of
Canterbury, Christchurch, and so am basking in sunshine rather than
snow!

I would first like to thank Keith Ellis, the departing Chair,
for the good
work that he did during his office, for organising such a successful
conference,
and for leaving the Society in a very healthy state. The membership and
finances
look healthy, conferences are increasingly successful, and The
Systemist
is developing a reputation way beyond its humble newsletter
origins. A
point at which there are possibilities for the Society to take on a
much more
major role in the development of systems ideas both in the academic
world, and
in practice.

Systems thinking has been developing as a definable body of
ideas for some
fifty years now. After a very stimulating and hopeful start in the 40's
and
50's, I feel that the impetus fell away somewhat as the limitations of
hard
systems thinking were recognised both in academic disciplines (e.g.,
functionalism in sociology) and in management and organisational
intervention.
However, in the last decade much progress has been made, for example in
cybernetics (with second order cybernetics and particularly theories of
self-reference and autopoiesis), in intervention methodologies (SSM and
critical
systems), and in information systems. We have now reached a moment when
there
is, and will be, a resurgence of interest in the use of systems ideas
in other
disciplines such as sociology and philosophy, as well as in more
traditional
areas such as management, ecology and so on. I believe that we, as
informed
systems people, will find ourselves more in demand, and much less
marginalised,
in the future than we have been recently.

If this analysis is correct, then the UKSS can play an
important role in
facilitating its members to make use of these opportunities, and in
promoting
both the development and spread of systems theory and practice. What
this
requires is that the Society, through its Committee, undertakes a
thorough
review of its medium term strategy and becomes more proactive in its
activities.
We have been very successful so far, but in only a small number of
activities -
the Conference, The Systemist, and a number of
seminars run at Warwick.
What we need to do is define clearly our strategy and then focus on a
number of
activities or ventures that will be of interest to current members,
will promote
systems ideas, and will thereby widen our membership in the future.
This is the
main task that I will pursue during my tenure as Chair.

In practical terms, we, the Committee, intend to hold special
sessions later
in the year at which we will formulate our strategy and develop a range
of
possible activities for the Society to be considered by the membership.
We would
very much like some help in this by way of input. What are your views
on what
should be the aims or mission of the Society; what particular
objectives we
should pursue in the next five to ten years; and what specific
activities we
should undertake in support of these objectives? We even have an
accumulated
surplus of some £8,000 available to support such activities. We are
aware
that both the membership and the committee are biased towards the
management/IS
end of the systems spectrum, so we would be particularly interested to
hear from
those of you who develop and use systems ideas in other domains and
disciplines.

So, could I ask as many of you as possible to send in your
ideas on anything
from particular types of activities or ways of spending money through
to general
mission statements for the Society as a whole. You can send them to me
either by
email:

I hope that we can all promote both systems thinking and the
UKSS in the
next few years.

Please get in touch with me if you want further information
about the UKSS
or to offer ideas as to initiatives that the Society might undertake. I
look
forward to returning sometime to NZ and visiting the parts that I
missed this
time.

Les Foulds, Department of Management Systems,
University of Waikato,
Hamilton

Current Research

1. Multicriteria decision making

In the context of multicriteria decision making, different
methodological
approaches to individual decision making, using laboratory experiments,
have
been performed. Evidence suggests considerable differences among
approaches in
terms of decision quality and preference for use; and these two are
often not
well correlated. The challenge is to acknowledge and incorporate the
behavioural aspects of decision making into new hybrid techniques
without
forsaking the normative or ideal approaches.

There has also been considerable joint work done by the
Department of
Strategic Management & Leadership and our Systems group (both
in the School
of Management Studies), on an investigation into the use of OR tools
and their
impact on strategic management.

2. Vehicle fleet deployment

Over the last ten years the Department has developed and
refined a
user-friendly, menu driven, decision support system which is designed
to aid
experienced milk tanker schedulers of New Zealand dairy companies, in
the
deployment of their vehicle fleets. A number of theoretical aspects
have been
researched and published, including: vehicle scheduling on tree-like
networks,
generalized assignment problem models, specialised machine sequencing
models for
pump scheduling, and techniques for assignment problems with side
constraints.
A separate project in this area concerns the use of queuing theory and
simulation techniques to promote more effective use of the vehicle
fleets of
public service organisations.

3. World class operations

These endeavours concern the formulation and solution
techniques for models
concerned with flexible manufacturing systems, machine scheduling with
controllable processing times and compression costs, project scheduling
with
resource constraints, a new unified approach to group technology,
studies into
the utility of world class manufacturing techniques, time-based
competition, the application of goal programming in artificial
breeding, and facilities
planning.

4. OR Education

Detailed experiments (in classes offered by the Department of
Management
Systems) into the value of student-centred and independent learning
approaches
to the teaching and learning of OR have been carried out.

Work with a New Zealand character

Much of the above work is of a New Zealand character,
especially the
research into vehicle fleet deployment. The vehicle routing decision
support
system mentioned above is currently in practical use in three New
Zealand dairy
companies and is being continuously developed and refined. It is in the
process
of being applied within the New Zealand oil industry. Techniques
developed for
effective vehicle fleet utilization were successfully adopted by a New
Zealand
regional electricity supply authority.

Three world class operations projects have a distinct New
Zealand character. Firstly, there has been a comprehensive study, which
was completed recently, on
the use of world class manufacturing techniques within New Zealand
industry. A
second recent study investigated the viability of the concepts and
techniques of
time- based competition within New Zealand organisations. A third
project
involved the development of goal programming models and techniques for
the
rostering of bulls used in an artificial breeding programme. The output
of this
research was applied successfully at a New Zealand livestock
improvement agency.

The project on student-centred learning has a definite New
Zealand
character, as the experiments have all been carried out in our
department.

A proposed project has recently received seeding funding to
investigate
prescriptive multicriteria decision making tools in New Zealand
organizations.

The research into the viability of OR tools in strategic
management resulted
in a large study of both New Zealand and British organizations in order
to
investigate the use of these tools in the two countries.

BRANCH GOSSIP COLUMNS

Golbon Zakeri, Department of Engineering Science,
University of
Auckland, Auckland

This year we have been fortunate to have visits from leaders
in OR such as
Professor George Nemhauser of Georgia Tech, Professor John Birge of the
University of Michigan, Professor Gerd Infanger of Stanford University,
and
Professor Jose Ventura of Penn State.

Last September two of our master's graduates, Mike O'Sullivan
and James
Deaker, started their PhD work at the prestigious Stanford University.
Mark
Smith joined RHE & Associates after completing his master's to
take up a
software Engineering position.

Most of our master's students will be leaving us this
September. Kevin Broad (last year's YPP winner) will be practicing his
OR skills at CORE. Ian Bowden
will be joining Coopers & Lybrand but not before his extensive
trip to the
middle east and central Europe. Sonya Rennie will be joining the Boston
Consulting Group after her travels in the US and Europe. Hamish Waterer
is off to Georgia Tech to work with Professor George Nemhauser, and
Claire O'Sullivan
will be leaving for London where she's hoping to put her OR skills to
work while
gaining OE! Best of luck to all of them.

Also a warm welcome to all of our new students, including
Debbie Williams
who's working with Andy Philpott on capacity expansion problems in
telecommunications, and David Neilsen who will be working with Andrew
Mason and
Steve Butt on a rostering GRIF with Mantrack Decision Group Ltd.

Kelvin H. Watson has completed and successfully defended his
PhD, "Graph
Theoretic Facilty Layout Design and Evaluation : Theoretical and
Practical
Considerations", supervised by John Giffin (who else?!). Kelvin
completed
his work in only slightly over two years — a record for Massey OR
graduates (Kelvin is the fourth so far, with four more currently in the
wings).
His work investigated the design of new and improved techniques for the
rectangular dualisation phase of Layout Design. The efficacy of the
approaches
was tested using concepts of regularity (as a surrogate for useability)
and the
incorporation of material handling systems to quantify transportation
cost in
test layouts. A three phase decomposition framework was also developed,
whereby
a decisionmaker could perturb problem constraints in a guided manner to
generate
a scenario of solutions which could be ranked using multiple criteria.

The thesis concluded that there is still life in the old GTLP
yet — it
can still comppete favourably with more classical Layout Design
methods, and the
construction of block plans has now been streamlined and given a
stronger
theoretical basis.

Kelvin is currently employed by James Hardy Pipelines in
Palmerston North,
where he is actually using his OR skills!

Kerri Mayes, Telecom, Wellington

New arrival among the teaching staff in the Management Group
at VUW is Dr
Michelle Baron. Michelle has just completed her PhD at Stanford. Her
speciality and PhD topic is Risk Management

Among the 7 ORSNZ members at IFORS were Vicky Mabin and John
Davies. Apparently there was some excellent (and well attended) talks
in the (new to
IFORS) areas of ?Teaching OR/MS' and ?Teaching using Cases'.

Hugh Barr, Matthew Hobbs, and Tom Nicolle have stepped out of
Industrial
Research Ltd and have formed Infosmart Ltd to continue their consulting
work. Infosmart provides business analysis, modelling and strategy
principally to
government agencies and primary processing / export companies.

Any of you Wellington people who think of something to go in
this section,
please let me know.

APORS'97 Update:
The Fourth Conference
of the Association of Asian-Pacific Operational Research Societies

As you may remember, the fourth APORS conference will be held
next year at
the World Congress Centre in Melbourne: the dates have been confirmed
as 30
November to 4 December 1997. Planning for the conference is going well,
according to Steve Weal, President of the Australian Society for
Operations
Research (ASOR), who spoke at the APORS committee meeting, held during
the IFORS
conference in Vancouver in July. Steve is coming to our local ORSNZ
conference
in August, so many of you will have the chance to meet Steve and talk
to him
about the conference.

ASOR is organising the conference, in close liaison with
ORSNZ, and is keen
to have as many New Zealanders as possible contributing to the
conference. It
will be a great opportunity for New Zealand OR people to exchange ideas
with
colleagues from Australia and all parts of Asia, the fastest growing
region of
the world, as well as participants from many other countries.

Now is the time to send off abstracts and ideas for tutorials,
sessions or
session streams, and offer any other suggestions for the technical or
social
programmes. Talk to Steve about the possibilities, or contact the
program
committee:

Remember this conference will replace our own ORSNZ conference
for next
year. The deadline for submission of abstracts is 28 February 1997.
Submission
forms can be obtained from Vicky Mabin or on-line from the web site.

In 1997, a new Master of Management Studies (MMS) degree in
Decision
Sciences will be offered jointly by the Management Group in the Faculty
of
Commerce and Administration and the Institute of Statistics and
Operations
Research at Victoria University of Wellington. The programme will
emphasise
modern developments in the decision sciences, incorporating linkages
between
'soft' operational research, systems approaches and traditional
operational
research. It will provide mathematically oriented students with the
concepts,
techniques and knowledge required to analyse complex managerial
problems and to
improve managerial decision making processes in organisations in
commerce,
business and government.

The MMS(DecSci) divides into two parts, spread over four
trimesters —
full-time students can therefore complete the degree in sixteen months.
Part 1
consists of four management papers and four decision science papers;
and Part 2
consists of a thesis, or a research project and four further papers.
The four
management papers cover general organisation processes, including the
way
organisations behave and how managers make decisions and plan
strategies for the
future. Also a course in research methods is provided which will allow
students
to prepare their research proposal for the Part 2 thesis or research
project.

The research for a thesis or research project could explore a
theoretical or
practical organisational issue by defining its problems, confronting
them with
the appropriate research methods, then communicating the results with
clarity
and precision. Where appropriate, mentors from client organisations may
be
arranged for students.

Mikael Ronnqvist, Department of
Engineering Science, University
of Auckland, Auckland

The Society managed to reopen the old Wellington post-box
and is now
running this together with the Auckland box.

The president reported that the OR group at Industrial
Research Ldt has broken up. Bruce Benseman and Hugh Barr have started
OR consulting businesses.

Air New Zealand will sponsor the Young Practitioner's
Prize 1996 with
$1200.

Mikael Ronnqvist will attend the IFORS96 conference as the
ORSNZ
representative.

John Buchanan of Waikato University has been appointed as
the new IFORS
representative, replacing Hugh Barr.

The President has been in contact with S. Kumar, the
current President of
APORS, and discussed making APJOR optional for all ORSNZ members. The
Secretary
is to hand over a time table for this process to S. Kumar at the
IFORS96
conference.

Dr Steve Butt has agreed to manage the membership database
and was
co-opted to Council.

The lack of membership support for the OR Newsletter was
discussed. Some
ideas floated were:

- Deadlines for copy to be disseminated to all Branches and
Council members,
and publicised in Newsletter.

A 'Branch News' section like NZMS Newsletter — a 'no news'
entry for
a branch/institution will be publicly excoriated (Webster: ?remove
part of
the skin, scathingly censure' — Have your pick! The
Editor).

Gossip columns from branches.

Abstracts and timetables for year 4 projects, Masters
projects, and PhD
projects.

Royal Society contributions.

Republished articles with permission form JORS Newsletter
and others.

· The OR Society in the UK advertise a number of short courses
for practitioners, which

are essentially training tutorials in some field that has
widespread
application. Example titles are: `Data Analysis and Database Design',
`Risk
Analysis', `System Dynamics Modelling', `Business Planning Models using
Spreadsheets', `How to be an OR Consultant'. NZIM do something similar
for
managers, with titles like `Negotiation skills' and `Logistics
Management',
which are typically taught by practitioners, not academics.

Council members were all positive about such courses, but
concluded that the
Society should not invent and run them. Instead they should be
initiated by
members who may seek endorsement from the Society.

· Overseas invited speaker policy: Following on a suggestion
by Vicky
Mabin, there was a discussion whether ORSNZ should provide a
contribution to the
expenses of getting international experts to visit NZ as invited
speakers.
Recently George Nemhauser was paid $500 by the Society, and all agreed
that his
visit was great value for money. It was agreed that the ORSNZ should
take more
advantage of academic and OR practitioners visiting particular
institutions in
NZ, and offer financial support to enable them to visit all the ORSNZ
Branches. Council agreed that the Society should build up a fund for
invited speakers to
travel within New Zealand to visit Branches. Grants in aid will be
disbursed
from this fund on a case-by-case basis to be decided by Council upon
receiving
an application from the visitor or host.

Items to be put on the AGM:

The membership rate is $45. Council agreed that is was not
desirable to
increase this, except to keep in step with the annual CPI, so as
maintain the
same level of service to members. Council proposes to make such
adjustments
every two years and that the membership fee for 1997 be adjusted to
$47.50.

The cost of postage of material to overseas members has
risen
considerably. In line with other OR societies, Council proposes that
overseas
members be charged for the increased postage.

A retired member suggested that the society should have a
Retired
Membership category with a reduced membership rate. Council proposes
that the
Society introduce an Associate Membership category with a fee equal to
the
student fee. The only service an associate member will get is the
Newsletter. To
become an associate member there is a requirement that the member
should have
been a full member of he Society for the last ten years and that the
member is
retired.

The issue of membership fees for recently graduated
students was raised. Council proposes that the Society allow graduating
students to keep their
student membership status during the financial year in which they
graduate.

ORSNZ conference locations: There is currently no specific
schedule of
the locations of the annual conference. Council propose the following
cyclical
schedule for the ORSNZ Conference location: Auckland (1998),
Victoria/Massey
(1999), Waikato (2000), Canterbury (2001), Auckland (2002).